Hyperliquid, Grass, and Story Protocol have been featured by Grayscale Research in its Q2 top 20 global crypto assets list, indicating their growing position in the industry.
These projects are a part of the rapidly growing sectors of decentralized finance, data monetization, and on-chain intellectual property management, according to the latest Grayscale Research Insight report published on Mar. 26.
With a $5.1 billion valuation, Hyperliquid (HYPE) focuses on on-chain perpetual trading to meet the growing demand for decentralized derivatives. Strong speculative interest is indicated by its 90-day price volatility of 121.7%.
Story Protocol, with a $1.5 billion market cap, focuses on blockchain-based IP rights and AI applications. Due to its quick adoption and price fluctuations, it has had the highest volatility among the top 20 featured assets at 417.3%.
Another AI-powered project, Grass (GRASS), lets users earn money off of the data they browse. Grass is becoming more and more popular in the growing data economy, with a market capitalization of $300 million and a volatility rate of 156%.
Broader market trends are also reflected in the report. Uniswap (UNI), Aave (AAVE), Ethena (ENA), and Lido DAO (LDO) have secured positions on the list, making DeFi one of the most dominant sectors. Alongside decentralized physical infrastructure networks like Helium (HNT) and Geodnet, AI-focused initiatives like BitTensor (TAO) and Virtuals Protocol (VIRTUAL) were also featured.
Arweave (AR), Akash Network (AKT), and Jupiter (JUP) have been removed from the top 20 list in this quarter’s reshuffle. Grayscale Research noted that these projects are still valuable in the crypto ecosystem despite their elimination.
According to the report, crypto valuations declined across the board in Q1 2025, alongside technology shares and risky assets. Bitcoin network activity, however, remained consistent, with a record 48 million wallets holding at least $1. Monthly active on-chain remained stable at 11 million, suggesting Bitcoin is being used more as a store of value than for transactions.
Meanwhile, there was a decline in activity on smart contract platforms, mostly as a result of less trading of memecoins on Solana. Solana still made $390 million in fees in Q1, which accounted for almost half of all smart contract platform revenues, despite this slowdown.
