TokenInsight: Crypto Exchange 2024 Annual Report

2024 has been a year of ups and downs. In the past year, the hope brought by the approval of the BTC spot ETF at the beginning of the year did not burn as brightly as expected. The market quickly pulled back after a brief rise. In Q2 and Q3, the entire market entered a consolidation phase, and exchanges were also recuperating. The turning point came in September. The dual benefits of the Fed's interest rate cut and the expectation of Trump's inauguration injected new momentum into the market and kicked off the bull market. The rise of the Meme craze and the AI ​​Agent narrative completely ignited the passion of crypto traders. As one of the most critical components of the cryptocurrency industry, changes in the trading volume and market share of exchanges reflect the evolution of market structure and the emotional shift of participants.

As a rating and research company in the Crypto industry, TokenInsight has been tracking the data of currencies and exchanges. In this report, we summarized the data performance of the exchange industry over the past year and selected the top ten centralized and decentralized exchanges, hoping to understand the changes in the past year and the competition in the exchange industry through the changes in the data.

The following data is a summary of the top ten exchanges selected by TokenInsight. This report does not include the total trading volume data of all exchanges for the following reasons:

• There are so many exchanges in the crypto industry that it is almost impossible to compile statistics for all exchanges.

• The top ten exchanges we selected account for more than 95% of the market share, and thus can roughly reflect the overall market situation.

The annual trading volume of the top 10 exchanges in 2024 is $76.88 trillion, nearly doubling from last year.

In Q1 2024, the sluggish market slightly recovered due to the approval of the Bitcoin spot ETF, pushing the BTC price above the $70,000 mark at the end of March. At the same time, the market's daily trading volume also rebounded to more than $200 billion.

However, the Bitcoin halving event in April did not continue the upward trend of BTC prices. The overall market performance in Q2 and Q3 was mediocre, and the BTC price stagnated and continued to fluctuate between $50,000 and $60,000; the market daily trading volume remained in the range of $100 billion to $200 billion.

In Q4, the bull market in the crypto market finally returned. The Fed’s interest rate cut and the US election in November jointly kicked off the bull market. Subsequently, the Meme craze and AI Agent narratives helped this carnival, further igniting the market’s trading enthusiasm. The total daily trading volume of the market reached a peak on December 21, approaching $700 billion; the BTC price also broke through the 100,000 mark, setting a new high, reaching a maximum of $106,074.11.

The top three exchanges in terms of cumulative market share of spot derivatives: Binance, OKX and Bybit

In terms of the cumulative trading volume for the whole year, Binance continued to rank first in the market with a cumulative spot and derivatives trading share of 38.6%, and its independent trading share in both the spot and derivatives markets also ranked first.

OKX and Bybit ranked second and third with cumulative market shares of 13.5% and 12.8% respectively. In terms of spot market share, Bybit surpassed OKX and ranked second with a spot trading share of 11.5%. In terms of derivatives, Bitget is gradually approaching the first echelon, occupying about 11.6% of the derivatives market.

Binance still leads the market in market share; MEXC has the largest increase, exceeding 9%

In 2024, Binance's market share fell from 42.2% at the beginning of the year to 32.7%, but it still leads the rest of the market.

Amid the changes in the overall cryptocurrency exchange market, the market shares of Bitget, BitMart, MEXC and Gate have all increased. Among them, MEXC has the largest increase, up about 9% from the beginning of the year. Although Bitget and BitMart did not perform as well as MEXC, their market shares have also increased by more than 5%.

Spot trading volumes on most centralized exchanges increased, with Bybit seeing the largest increase of 8.5%

In 2024, the spot trading volume of most centralized exchanges has increased significantly. The bull market in Q4 has stimulated traders' enthusiasm for spot. This positive sentiment is particularly evident in popular emerging tracks such as AI Agent and DeSci. Investors are keen to seize the next 100x or even 1000x opportunity in the bull market, actively invest in spot, and purchase a large number of early potential project tokens.

Among the top ten centralized exchanges, Bybit added more than 50 spot assets in Q4, and its spot trading volume increased the most year-on-year, reaching 8.5%. At the same time, as a leading centralized exchange, Binance also implemented an active spot strategy and launched Binance Alpha in Q4.

Among other exchanges, BingX, BitMart and Bitget are still highly dependent on derivatives trading, with their derivatives trading volume accounting for more than 90% of the total trading volume. On the contrary, KuCoin and Gate continue to deepen their presence in spot trading and maintain a significant market share.

Binance still maintains its dominance in the spot market; Bitget's spot share increased by 8.06%, becoming the biggest winner

In 2024, the total spot trading volume increased by 111.42%, more than double that of 2023. Binance performed strongly in the first half of the year, accounting for more than half of the spot market. However, during the bull market in Q4, its spot market share fluctuated, but it still maintained its dominance with a 43% share.

Bitget performed best in the bull market in Q4, with its spot market share increasing by 8.06% year-on-year. Among other exchanges, MEXC and Bybit also saw a slight increase in their market share. In contrast, BingX's spot market share fell sharply, down 3.19% year-on-year, which was likely affected by the hacking incident in the second half of the year.

Binance continues to lead the derivatives market; MEXC’s derivatives share increased the most, up to 10.4%

In 2024, the total derivatives trading volume surged by 132.35%. Although Binance's derivatives market share has declined, it is still far ahead of other exchanges with a share of 33%.

Both MEXC and BitMart have seen significant growth in their derivatives market share. Compared to 2023, MEXC's derivatives market share increased by 10.4%, the largest increase. BitMart's share rose by 9%, and its market share is gradually approaching OKX.

Among other exchanges, Bybit's performance was relatively stable, with no significant change in share. In contrast, BingX's derivatives market share fell by 6.01%, significantly lagging behind other centralized exchanges.

The total annual transaction volume of the top 10 DEXs reached 2 trillion US dollars; Hyperliquid surpassed Uniswap to become the leader of DEX

With the meme craze led by Pump.fun at the end of the year, the price of SOL soared, and the Solana ecosystem became the most watched Layer1 besides Ethereum in 2024. Raydium, as the leading exchange in the Solana ecosystem, increased its market share by 10.26%. On the contrary, Orca's performance was disappointing. Despite the favorable ecological environment, its market share fell by about 4%.

In early November 2024, with the arrival of Hyperliquid's coin issuance news, Hyperliquid became the most watched new dark horse DEX in the bull market. Its average daily trading volume surpassed Raydium and big brother Uniswap in December, jumping to the top of DEX. Its market share reached 30.87% at the end of the year, an increase of 27.86% from the beginning of the year.

In contrast, the performance of the old traditional DEX: Uniswap and Pancakeswap in 2024 was not satisfactory. Uniswap's market share was eaten up by Raydium and Hyperliquid, falling to 21.85%, falling from the first place. Pancakeswap's share fell by about 8.9%, being squeezed to 3.39%.

By the end of 2024, DEX trading volume will increase significantly, accounting for 2.98% of the total market trading volume

In Q1 2024, the total trading volume of the crypto market was about 19 trillion US dollars, and DEX accounted for about 2%. As the market gradually entered a consolidation phase, the market trading volume declined in the next two quarters. However, the data shows that traders are gradually turning to DEX.

In Q4, with the return of the bull market, market trading volume rebounded sharply, almost double the level at the beginning of the year. The growth of total market trading volume was mainly driven by on-chain narratives, including the memecoin boom on Solana, the rise of the AI-Driven ecosystem, and the strong performance of Hyperliquid. These factors jointly pushed the DEX share up to nearly 3%. Traders are increasingly inclined to DEX in this round of bull market, and are more actively looking for high-potential investment opportunities on the chain.

By the end of 2024, Hyperliquid's trading volume reached $12 billion, and its total locked value exceeded $3 billion

Hyperliquid became the biggest winner in DEX in Q4 2024. Affected by the overall market trading sentiment in the first half of the year, Hyperliquid's average daily trading volume has been fluctuating between $2 billion and $3 billion from Q1 to Q3. In Q4, Hyperliquid's trading volume rose sharply, breaking the historical high in the mid-term, and the trading volume reached $12 billion at the end of the year.

At the same time, Hyperliquid's ecosystem is also expanding steadily, and a large number of emerging projects in different fields have emerged within its ecosystem. These include DeFi infrastructure, token issuance platforms, AI trading robots, etc. As of December 31, 2024, Hyperliquid's total locked value has exceeded US$2 billion.

Most centralized exchange platform coins performed well in Q4, with BGB performing the best

In 2024 Q4, BGB performed outstandingly. On December 28, its price soared 1308% from the beginning of the year, far exceeding Bitcoin and other centralized exchange platform coins. GT followed closely behind, with a year-end increase of 213%, ranking second. Among other platform coins, BNB and LEO's price returns also outperformed Bitcoin. Among them, BNB's market value ranks fifth among all cryptocurrencies and is currently the exchange platform coin with the highest market value.

On the contrary, OKB’s performance was relatively weak. At the end of 2024, its price was 9% lower than that at the beginning of the year.

Most emerging DEX platform coins outperformed established DEX platform coins; AERO had the highest increase, exceeding 2000%

In Q4 2023, most emerging DEX platform coins performed significantly better than traditional established DEX platform coins. For example, RAY on the Solana chain and CETUS on the Sui chain have both outperformed traditional DEX platform coins such as UNI, CAKE, and CRV. And HYPE’s price soared by 300% in just one month after its launch. The returns of AERO and THE are even more amazing. THE has increased by 500%, and AERO’s price has rocketed by more than 2000%.

In contrast, established DEX platform coins such as UNI and CAKE performed poorly, with their prices lagging behind Bitcoin.