Gaming grows to 48% of all blockchain activity | DappRadar

Gaming grew to 48% of all blockchain activity during the month of January, up from 45% in December, according to market research firm DappRadar.

In January 2023, the daily unique active wallet reached 839,436. It means that there were so many users doing blockchain game transactions during January.

This is a bullish indicator for the long-term potential of blockchain gaming, DappRadar said in its latest report. Nevertheless, the number is so low that it shows that blockchain games are still quite far from mainstream acceptance.

“The game alphas and updates keep coming in the blockchain space and there is a growing sense of excitement and anticipation for what the future holds,” said DappRadar. “As the sector continues to mature, we can expect to see even more exciting developments in the coming months.”

That may sound overly optimistic, considering we’re still in the midst of a cryptocurrency winter and a global economic downturn. But everything is relative, and blockchain games are cause for some optimism after a tough 2022. Maybe, just maybe, things can get better.

Overall, DappRadar said 2023 has started with a strong and bullish trend, especially in the NFT market. On-chain metrics have shown significant growth and activity, indicating a booming and promising quarter for NFTs. Assets locked in blockchain protocols (DeFI TVL, or total value locked in a protocol) reached $74.6 billion, up 26.8% from last month.

The NFT market recorded $941 million in trading volume and $9.2 million in sales. Polygon was the standout performer, recording a 124% increase in trading volume and 157.39% increase in sales figures, driven by the popularity of its NFT collections such as Collect Donald Trump Cards and the launch of the Mocaverse Realm Ticket Pass.

Opensea has an increase in trading volume of 66.58% and reached $495 million in January 2023. This represents 58% of the total trading volume of the NFT market. And more than $14.6 million was lost to exploits in January 2023, the lowest amount recorded since January 2022. DappRadar interprets all these data points as signs of improvement.

While the number of active gaming wallets increased in January, the number in terms of daily unique active wallets decreased, falling 9.55% to 1,730,542 compared to December.

WAX was the most popular blockchain in January. The gaming and NFT blockchain averaged 394,480 dUAW, up 3.39% from last month. Blockchain game Alien Worlds and NFT marketplace Atomic Assets were the top dapps on the WAX ​​blockchain.

In third place we find Polygon with 191,985 dUAW. The blockchain ecosystem made a splash in late 2022, and is now down 5.22% from last month. Benji Bananas and Planet IX were the most popular dapps on Polygon.

Planet IX had a good month, increasing 44% to reach 141,580 UAW. Hive came in fourth with a 12.31% increase, reaching 182,800 dUAW. Splinterlands dominated activity on the Hive, and the trading card game saw a 5.87% increase in UAW, reaching 340,520 UAW.

The best performing blockchain in January was Solana, with a 70% increase it reached an average of 53,683 dUAW. Growth was driven by increased use of Solana DeFi dapps such as Raydium, MeanFi, Saber and Orca. It appears that the Solana ecosystem is recovering from the damage caused by the FTX collapse, DappRadar said.

The Ethereum ecosystem also saw an increase in its unique active wallets, seeing activity increase by 39% to reach an average of 116,255 dUAW. The popularity of NFT marketplaces such as OpenSea and Manifold and the increased activity on the marketplaces can be seen as the drivers of these numbers.

Despite the decline in the industry’s overall dUAW, the on-chain calculations for NFT show increased activity. This is a bullish sign for the market.

Solana saw a 57.33% increase in TVL, reaching $548 million. This growth was driven by the performance of Marinade Finance, which had an 84.32% increase in TVL in the last 30 days, reaching $152 million. Marinade Finance has introduced a token incentive scheme to reward users who deposit Solana (SOL) tokens in return for mSOL, a floating stake derivative. Orca and Raydium also showed an increase in TVL, with 37% and 33% increases respectively, reaching $46 million and $38 million.

The shift to proof-of-stake (PoS) by Ethereum has been a catalyst for the growing interest in staking solutions. Lido has been quick to capitalize on this, and fee revenue has been directly proportional to Ethereum PoS revenue, as it sends received ether to the staking protocol.

The NFT market seems to recover with the increase in NFT trading volumes and sales figures in January 2023. The NFT trading volume recorded a 37% increase from the previous month, reaching $941 million. This is the highest trading volume recorded since June 2022. The number of NFTs sold also increased by 38% from the previous month, reaching 9.2 million.

Leading NFT blockchain Ethereum has a dominance of 78.5% in the NFT market. It recorded a 37.29% increase in trading volume, reaching $659 million. Sales figures for Ethereum NFTs also increased by 7.37% from last month, now reaching just over 2 million. Yuga Labs’ NFT collections have contributed significantly to the ecosystem’s growth. Their latest NFT collection, an access pass NFT called the Sewer Pass that gives holders access to an online game, has created a buzz in the NFT world.

Solana comes in second, with a 23.7% increase in trading volume, reaching $86 million. DeGods and Monkey Kingdom are the best NFT collections on Solana. Although the trading volume increased, the sales figure decreased by 5.79% to reach 788,992. The increase in volume mainly comes from the strong performance of the native cryptocurrency SOL.

Polygon has recorded a 124% increase in NFT trading volume, reaching $46 million. The number of sales of Polygon NFTs also increased by 157.39% from last month, reaching 4.5 million. The popularity of Collect Donald Trump Cards and the recent launch of the Mocaverse Realm Ticket Pass have fueled this growth.

Immutable X recorded a 3.67% decrease in NFT trading volume, and the blockchain network recorded $14.2 million in trading volume. However, the sales figures increased by 2.39% and now reached 564,832. Gods Unchained and Illuvium Land are the leading NFT collections on Immutable X, with trading volume of $9.89 million and $1.46 million in the last 30 days.

OpenSea remains the leading marketplace with a 66.58% increase in NFT trading volume, reaching a staggering $495 million. This is a clear indication of OpenSea’s unceasing dominance in the NFT space, representing 58% of the entire NFT trading volume in January 2023. Based on the recorded trading volume and the 2.5% fee that OpenSea charges per transaction, the platform further made approximately $12 .3 million in income.

The largest exploit of the month took place on the LendHub lending protocol on the Heco network, resulting in a loss of approximately $6 million. The vulnerability was in the lBSV contract duplication, allowing the attacker to deposit money into the old version and borrow from the new market. By exploiting the flow of the coining and redemption process, the attacker made a profit worth $6 million before moving the stolen assets to other chains such as Ethereum and Optimism.

“In conclusion, 2023 has started on a high note, with bullish on-chain numbers in the DeFi and NFT markets,” said DappRadar. “The reduction in money lost this month due to exploits, the lowest amount ever recorded in 2022, is a positive indication of the increase in blockchain security.”

I don’t know if that’s a good selling point for the mainstream: We didn’t lose as much money to thieves this month compared to last month.

Still, DappRadar said: “The upward trend in the NFT market and the growth of DeFi platforms give us reason to be optimistic about the future of the crypto market. With this promising development, we can expect a recovery and continued growth in the coming months.”