CoinDesk’s Q2 2018 State of Blockchain brings together the key trends, data and events of the past three months in over 100 slides of charts, graphs and useful facts. The report also cites a 60+ question sentiment survey taken by over 1200 people.

State of Blockchain

Major cryptocurrencies were filled with negative market indicators for a second straight quarter. Most downtrends highlighted exchange activity, where volumes were down for most trade pairs.

But outside of the cryptocurrency market trends, use cases and developer work continued strong growth the past three months. Improvements are in place for both Bitcoin (Liquid Network) and Ethereum (Raiden) networks. Major corporations such as IBM, Walmart and many international banks submitted patents or implement processes related to the technology. Regulation continues to develop in the U.S., but Malta has showing complete adoption.

Statistical Highlights:

BTC miner revenues -22%, average fees -19%
Bitcoin hashrate +26% (decreased transaction speeds)
ICO funding ~$19 billion, average ICO ~$39 million
Most survey respondents believe price declines were caused by shorts and inconsistent rebounds from over-speculation
Of the top coins, EOS was by far the stand out +44%. Two top coins dropped significantly, LTC -32% and XMR -29%.

Where is the money coming from?

The report showcases the massive funding that is still coming into blockchain and cryptocurrency related projects, but also a strong differential between the top 4 ICOs and the top 4 traditional VC funding rounds in Q2.

Initial Coin Offerings

EOS ($4.2B) finished their ICO and launched their mainnet. A blockchain competitor to Youtube TaTaTu ($575M) was funded by major investors like members of the Bacardi family. Basis ($133M) created a stablecoin through a process of creating and removing coins to induce or remove scarcity to maintain a consistent price. Orbs ($118M) developed a dapp on the Ethereum network that brings “consumer scale” capability for transaction frequency and volume.

Venture Capital Funding

The top four projects related to industry funded by VCs received significantly less funding in total. But this is primarily because of EOS. Bitmain ($300M) is a Chinese based company that created the first consumer-grade ASIC miner. Circle ($110M) introduced a platform for investing in top cryptocurrencies. Pintec ($103M) provides fintech services that include blockchain based applications. Paxos ($65M) offers primarily blockchain based financial services and runs itBit.