The last week of March (from March 23 to 24) was not good for the cryptocurrency investment product. Digital asset funds recorded their first outflows in five weeks, worth $414 million, according to a weekly report from CoinShares.
This has more to do with investor sentiments and price action.
Escalating global tensions between the US and Iran, accompanied by high inflation and growing expectations surrounding the upcoming Federal Reserve meetings, are the main reasons behind this shift.
As a result of these developments from politics to economics, total assets under management (AuM) have fallen to $129 billion. If you look closely, such levels were already reached in early February and April 2025, when volatility was high due to changing tariff policies.
Winners and losers of the past week
That said, in this outflow, Ethereum [ETH] was hit hardest, recording outflows worth $222 million. This further reduced outflows this year to $273 million.
Well, this decline may be due to the continued uncertainty surrounding the CLARITY Act. Meanwhile, the price of ETH has also been choppy as it faced a 2.48% decline over the past week.
Interestingly enough: Bitcoin [BTC] stood strong, but there was still room for caution. The leading cryptocurrency recorded outflows worth $194 million last week.
However, if you look at the annual figures, net inflows were strong: $964 million. This came as the price of Bitcoin witnessed a weekly decline of 3.48%.
Needless to say, Solana [SOL] was no exception, as this sector also recorded outflows of $12.3 million, while the stock was down 5.97% over the past week.
Interestingly, Ripple’s XRP was the only one to register an inflow worth $15.8 million. However, the price reflected the broader market decline, falling 4.68% over the past week.
For example, XRP was the winner among digital asset funds last week, while ETH was the loser.
Are on-chain metrics in favor?
This sentiment was further confirmed by Santiment’s active address metric, where Bitcoin and Ethereum had both seen a decline in the aforementioned metric at the end of March.
This suggests that only a few people have invested in the network, compared to the high activity in early March.
Meanwhile, Solana’s social volume has also dropped, meaning fewer people are talking about the altcoin.
Finally, while XRP was the winner, network activity suggests that caution remains due to a sharp decline in the number of active addresses in late March.
The US is in for its choppiest week
While the US saw a maximum outflow worth $454 million, Switzerland saw an outflow of $4 million. While Canada and Germany saw inflows worth $15.9 million and $21.2 million respectively
However, now that we are approaching the end of March and March 30 is the first day of a new week, the market is picking up again. The total cryptocurrency market cap is back in bullish hands, trading at $2.34 trillion at the time of writing.
But despite this rise, investors should not be fooled by short-term booms, as even last week $635 million had flowed in just before the Fed meeting, creating optimism in the market.
However, as soon as the meeting came to an end, $405 million flowed out of the market, leaving investors in shock. Therefore, until the situation calms down globally, short-term prices are not a clear sign for longer-term market forecasts.
Final summary
- The shift from inflows to outflows indicates that there is a lot of FUD in the market and investors are positioning their investments cautiously.
- Bitcoin is holding strong, but XRP is stealing the spotlight, highlighting that investors are no longer just betting on Bitcoin.