- Ethereum faced a turbulent Q1 as its price fell by 52.49% year-to-date, underperforming against Bitcoin and XRP, which saw significantly smaller losses
- Despite expectations of sustained deflationary trends, Ethereum was deflationary for only three days in Q1 2025, highlighting reduced network activity and lower-than-expected transaction fees
- Ether transactions led token burns in Q1, incinerating 3.4 ETH worth $5.3 million, but diminished trading activity significantly slowed overall burn rates, impacting Ethereum’s supply dynamics
The first quarter of this year proved challenging for digital assets. While early Q1 maintained the bullish momentum sparked in November 2024, investor sentiment shifted as January ended, leading to stagnation and later a bearish downturn.
This reversal led nearly all digital assets to lose momentum and value. As of today, April 17, nearly all cryptocurrencies in the market have completely erased their November rally gains.
The world’s largest altcoin by market capitalization, Ethereum, has fallen into an interesting place. Ether has underperformed against nearly all top-10 assets in 2025, signaling concerns for holders.
At this time of writing, $ETH is down by a whopping 52.49% year-to-date. Its performance against its main competitors shows how much Ether has struggled amid broader market uncertainty. On that same timeframe, Bitcoin and XRP saw losses of 9.13% and 0.57%, respectively.
Ether is currently trading at $1,583 according to CoinMarketCap, up by 4.17% in the week but still at a 17.54% deficit over the last 30 days.
Ether Was Only Deflationary for 3 Days In 2025 Q1
A recent report by CoinGecko assessing the state of the cryptocurrency market during 2025’s first quarter revealed a stark trend for Ethereum. Despite expectations of sustained deflationary behavior post-Merge, Ether was deflationary for only three days in Q1 2025.
During the first quarter, only 42,200 ETH were burned, while the Ethereum ecosystem emitted over 232,000 new ETH coins into its supply. Effectively, Ethereum’s supply expanded by 185,000 ETH—around $293 million.
There were only three days in Q1 when Ethereum burned more tokens than it emitted. The drop in trading activity led trading bots like Maestro and Banana Gun to significantly decrease their ETH-burning rate.
Ether transactions were the largest contributor to token burns in Q1, incinerating 3.4 ETH ($5.3 million), followed by Uniswap, USDT, USDC, 0x Protocol, and Metamask.
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