The quarter was also marked by the lack of an altcoin rally, despite both Bitcoin and Ethereum hitting all-time highs — this is a departure from previous cycles but hope remains of an alt season in Q4.
The third quarter of 2025 marked an important milestone in the maturation of digital assets, with increased corporate buy-in and a regulatory environment — particularly in the US — continuing to warm to crypto, a new industry report from Brisbane-based crypto exchange Swyftx finds.
Swyftx CEO Jason Titmus said Q3 showed the conversation is “shifting from ‘if’ to ‘how'”, setting the stage for further integration of digital assets into TradFi over 2026 and beyond.
This bullish outlook is based largely on two of the stronger market narratives to come out of Q3 — the continued growth of stablecoins and the emergence of crypto treasury companies.
The report highlights that the combined stablecoin market cap grew throughout Q3 by 17% following the July passage in the US of legislation to regulate stablecoins known as the GENIUS Act. By the end of Q3, the total stablecoin market cap had hit an all-time high of almost US$300 million (AU$462 million).
The adoption of cryptocurrency as corporate treasury also expanded throughout Q3, with Ethereum in particular seeing widespread adoption as a corporate treasury asset. During September alone, two of the largest corporate Ether holders, BitMine and SharpLink Gaming, acquired a combined total of over US$3 billion (AU$4.62 billion) worth of Ether.
We saw this corporate stockpiling of crypto spread beyond Bitcoin and Ether and smaller altcoins, such as Solana and even Dogecoin, are now being stockpiled. This trend, according to Swyftx, demonstrates a deeper integration of digital assets into traditional finance and lends digital assets greater credibility.
Q3 Defined by Flagging Altcoins Momentum, Says Lead Analyst
Swyftx’s lead market analyst, Pav Hundal, said Q3 of 2025 was largely defined by the failure of altcoins to maintain any real momentum. Hundal said altcoins are now in the midst of their longest consolidation period ever without seeing a broad breakout.
It’s not necessarily all doom and gloom for the altcoin bag holders out there though. In earlier cycles, when Bitcoin has hit new all-time highs, altcoins have rallied — Bitcoin has already achieved all-time highs this cycle, but we’re still yet to see an alt season. Hundal said it might still happen.
Despite the lack of a full-blown alt season through Q3, there were some pockets of relative strength in the market with the strongest performing sectors by price action being DeFi, which grew 119%, layer 1s, which grew 70% and, surprisingly, NFTs, which saw price growth of 58%.
Figures Show Gen X and Boomers Investing More Into Crypto
SwyftX’s trading data revealed in the report showed that Gen Z and Millennials were responsible for the majority of orders on the platform — accounting for a combined total of 67% of all orders, but they only accounted for around 50% of trade volume.
This suggests, perhaps unsurprisingly, that while these younger generations are more interested in crypto, they may lack the wealth to buy as much as they’d like. On the other hand, Gen Xers and Boomers, while accounting for only 33% of total orders, made up just under 50% of volume. Boomers alone accounted for just 6% of orders yet made up 11.7% of volume.
Q3 also saw significant growth in self-managed super funds (SMSFs) trading on Swyftx, with SMSF volume surging 40% and the number of unique SMSF accounts using the exchange growing 37%.
Read more on Crypto News Australia
