SideShift.ai Weekly Report | 25th February - 3rd March 2025

Welcome to the one hundred and forty-third edition of the weekly stats report - your one-stop shop for all things SideShift.ai.

This past week saw SideShift token (XAI) experience a sharp drop early on, falling from just under $0.195 to $0.175, where it hovered for the majority of the period. The latter half of the week saw minor fluctuations, with XAI ticking upwards slightly to $0.1764 at the time of writing. It currently holds a market cap of $25,449,843 (-8.63%). 

XAI stakers saw steady returns, earning an average APY of 10.10%. The largest payout occurred on March 1st, when 41,452.81 XAI was distributed directly to the staking vault at an APY of 12.24%, coinciding with a peak daily volume of $4.07m, By week’s end, stakers had accumulated a total of 241,723.93 XAI, valued at $42,883 USD.

An additional 100,000 USDC was sent to SideShift’s treasury last week, bringing the current total to $20.72m. Users are encouraged to follow along directly with treasury updates via sideshift.ai/treasury.

Additional XAI updates:

Total Value Staked: 131,298,169 XAI (+0.1%)
Total Value Locked: $22,781,807 (-10.9%)

General Business News

Volatility gripped crypto markets last week, with the Fear and Greed Index plunging to 10/100, its lowest level since June 2022, a time when Terra (Luna) collapsed, Celsius became insolvent, and BTC fell below $20k. Despite the uncertainty, President Trump’s recent announcement of a U.S. Strategic Crypto Reserve, set to include BTC, ETH, SOL, XRP, and ADA, triggered a sharp rally, pushing BTC past $95k and ETH above $2,600. However, this surge was very short-lived and a steep retracement followed within a day, sending BTC tumbling below $84k, completely erasing its gains, and ETH sliding below $2,100, its lowest level since December 2023.

SideShift embraced the volatility and continued its steady pace, with our gross weekly volume landing at $19.1m (-2.5%). While this week’s total volume trailed its running YTD average by -16.6%, it remained in line with the slower periods observed earlier in the year and has shown notable consistency over the past four weeks. User shifting volume held firm at $14.7m, while liquidity shifting dipped to $4.4m (-9.8%), reflecting a lesser need for internal rebalancing. Stablecoin shifts remained a central focus among users, with BTC/USDT (ERC20) leading at $1.23m, followed by BTC/USDC (ERC20) at $782k, reinforcing the growing preference for stablecoins - a trend already emerging last week.

Meanwhile, our gross shift count climbed +2% to 10,712 shifts, finishing just -4.2% behind its running YTD average. A notable spike in activity occurred on March 3rd, which alone netted 2,337 shifts, a daily figure that has only been achieved a few times in SideShift’s history. This strong engagement carried through the end of the period, resulting in daily averages of $2.72m in volume across 1,530 shifts, with momentum continuing into the current week.

BTC maintained its dominance with $8.4m (+16.4%) in total weekly volume (deposits + settlements), solidifying its position as the most-shifted asset on SideShift. The increase was primarily fueled by a +44.4% rise in user deposits, which reached $3.88m, while settlements edged up to $3.13m (+4.2%). This marked BTC’s most active week in over a month, with users showing renewed interest following a stretch of subdued but still steady shifting.

USDT (ERC20) surged into second place for the first time since November 2024, underscoring the growing shift toward stablecoins. Its total volume climbed +32.3% to $5.57m, with deposits rising +42.6% to $1.48m and settlements reaching $2.35m (+17.6%). Stablecoin popularity has been steadily increasing, with stablecoins being involved in 58% of total shift volume this week, up nearly +10% from last week and reaching their highest combined proportion in months. The increasing presence of stablecoins suggests a recalibration of priorities, with users leaning toward predictability in the near term.

On the other end of the spectrum, SOL’s total volume slumped -28.1% to $3.83m, a multi-month low, making it the weakest performer among the top five. Deposits fell -34.0% to $1.50m, while settlements dropped -16.6% to $1.52m, signaling a continued retreat from SOL shifts. ETH followed a similar trajectory, shedding -21.1% in volume to $3.19m, also marking its lowest total in several months. Deposits lagged at $1.55m (-14.2%), while settlements held relatively steady at $1.54m (-1.7%). Notably, SOL and ETH were the only two coins in the top five to see declines, with both marking a third successive week of reduced activity.

Shifting across alternate networks to ETH remained in a clear downtrend, as declines persisted across most major chains and users directed their focus elsewhere. The Solana network continued to set the pace, but overall volume dipped -17.7% to $5.68m, extending its three-week slide. Despite this, stablecoin activity remained steady, with USDC (SOL) volume holding firm at $1.4m, while USDT (SOL) more than doubled to $454k. The TRON network followed closely at $3.50m (-0.3%), thanks to the reliable flow of USDT (TRC20) shifting. Meanwhile, BSC shifting dropped -16.2% to $1.47m, while Base saw the sharpest decline, tumbling -74.5% to $308k, as last week’s sudden burst of activity quickly faded. Polygon was the lone gainer, climbing +38.9% to $536k, though its overall presence remained relatively minor.

In listing news, SideShift engineers have been actively expanding token and chain support, with Berachain (BERA) now live for shifting. Several more additions are in progress and expected to go live within the week.

Affiliate News 

Our top affiliates had a strong showing this week, collectively generating $8.52m (+24.0%), the highest total since late January 2025. The order remained unchanged, with our first-place affiliate setting a new record at $5.25m (+4.5%), accounting for 27.6% of SideShift’s weekly volume. Meanwhile, second place nearly doubled to $1.29m (+87.9%), while third place surged +118.8% to $953k. Affiliates ranked 2-5 all posted gains exceeding +60%, demonstrating widespread growth across the board.

Altogether, top affiliates accounted for 44.7% of total volume, climbing +9.5% from last week’s share.

That’s all for now. Thanks for reading and happy shifting.