Bitcoin maintained its role as the market’s anchor asset in July, to a fresh record of $123,000. Its performance, however, coincided with a notable change in market structure as investor capital flowed aggressively into altcoins.
According to Binance Research’s market insights shared with CryptoPotato, Bitcoin’s dominance fell by 5.2% to 60.6%. During the same period, altcoin dominance climbed to 39.2% which happens to be one of 2025’s largest monthly jumps.
The rotation was supported by improved macroeconomic sentiment, optimism around a potential US Federal Reserve rate-cut cycle, and the absence of destabilizing market events.
Leading this shift was Ethereum, which surged 51% over the month, buoyed by record institutional participation. Corporate ETH treasuries rose 127.7% to over 2.7 million ETH, and amounted to nearly half the holdings of US-listed ETH ETFs. In July, 24 companies incorporated ETH into their balance sheets and opted for direct ownership instead of ETF exposure to benefit from staking rewards and Ethereum’s deflationary supply model.
Beyond Ethereum, several other altcoins posted significant gains. XRP, SUI, Cardano (ADA), Dogecoin (DOGE), and BNB all benefited from ecosystem developments, expanding corporate adoption, and growing investor interest in DeFi and tokenization use cases.
This market-wide rally reflected a market increasingly willing to diversify beyond Bitcoin as sentiment toward altcoin utility strengthened. In the stablecoin sector, the passage of the GENIUS Act on July 17 was a regulatory breakthrough in the US, introducing a federal framework for fully reserved, AML-compliant stablecoins.
The development spurred institutional adoption. For instance, JPMorgan expanded its deposit-token pilot, Citi advanced tokenized deposit trials for cross-border settlements, and Visa committed to scaling stablecoin-based payments. On-chain stablecoin settlement volumes continued to exceed Visa’s transaction throughput.
The NFT sector witnessed a sharp rebound. Binance Research found that the total trading volume jumped almost 50% in July. The top position in sales volume was dominated by Ethereum-based NFTs, which saw a 58% gain. Bitcoin NFTs also rose more than 28%.
The standout driver was a 393% spike in CryptoPunks sales following a headline-grabbing whale purchase. Polygon-based NFT activity, however, saw a decline. Industry discussions around embedding NFTs within ETF structures suggested early-stage institutional exploration of the sector.