August was the worst month for the crypto markets since Bitcoin (BTC) bottomed out in November 2022. What was initially perceived by many as merely a summer slump turned into a pronounced market downturn as liquidations cascaded on the derivatives market, erasing 7.3% of BTC’s and 6.9% of Ether’s (ETH) value. Grayscale’s court victory was only a temporary reprieve from these losses, as the price retraced back to the levels starting out the month. This caused one of the largest liquidation events in crypto, totaling more than $1 billion lost when the price dropped to $26,000.
To further kick the industry when it was down, venture capital (VC) investment inflows were down 42.7% in August from July, only bringing in $401.9 million across 77 deals. Investment in the crypto industry was on the rise up until May of this year but has been steadily declining since.