Introduction
A new report from crypto intelligence firm Messari paints a stark picture of Avalanche’s fourth quarter in 2025, revealing a dramatic decoupling between its collapsing token price and its surging network fundamentals. While AVAX’s value plummeted nearly 60%, the underlying blockchain shattered records for user adoption and transaction volume, suggesting a resilient ecosystem operating independently of severe market headwinds.
Key Points
- AVAX price fell 59% QoQ, but network fees paid in AVAX increased 24.9%, breaking the typical link between price and on-chain economic activity.
- Daily active addresses surged an extraordinary 16,360% year-over-year to 24.7 million, indicating massive user adoption despite the bear market.
- Real-World Asset (RWA) TVL on Avalanche grew nearly 70% quarter-over-quarter to $1.33 billion, emerging as the ecosystem's strongest growth segment.
A Steep Valuation Decline Amidst Soaring Usage
The final quarter of 2025 was punishing for Avalanche’s market valuation. According to Messari, the native token AVAX fell 59.0% quarter-over-quarter, dropping from approximately $30.00 in September to around $12.30 by year’s end. This 65.5% year-over-year decline dragged its circulating market capitalization down 58.3% QoQ to $5.3 billion, causing its rank among digital assets to slip from 14th to 21st place.
In sharp contrast, on-chain activity exploded, breaking the typical correlation between token price and network economic activity. While total fees measured in US dollars declined a modest 11.7%, fees paid in native AVAX tokens surged 24.9% QoQ, from 105,719 AVAX to 132,016 AVAX. This indicates users were transacting more heavily even as the token’s dollar value fell. Average daily transactions on the primary C-Chain jumped 63% to 2.1 million, with a single-day liquidation event on October 10 generating $520,715 in fees—the highest daily total on Avalanche since February 2024.
Record-Breaking Network and User Growth
Looking beyond the C-Chain, Avalanche’s entire ecosystem reached unprecedented activity levels. Aggregate average daily transactions across all Avalanche Layer-1 networks accelerated to 38.2 million, a 4.5% quarterly increase and an astonishing 1,162.1% surge compared to Q4 2024. User adoption metrics were even more dramatic. Average daily active addresses climbed 25.1% QoQ to 24.7 million, representing a year-over-year increase of over 16,000%.
This made Q4 2025 the busiest quarter on record for the C-Chain specifically, where transactions rose 69.0% QoQ. The only metric that mirrored the token’s price decline was staking. The total USD value of staked AVAX fell 59.9% QoQ to $2.3 billion, a direct consequence of the lower token price rather than a mass exodus of staked assets.
DeFi Resilience and the RWA Breakout
Avalanche’s decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem demonstrated notable resilience. Messari’s DeFi Diversity Score, which measures protocol concentration, improved 5.9% QoQ to 18.0, indicating a healthier, more distributed ecosystem. While the total value locked (TVL) across Avalanche L1s and the C-Chain, measured in US dollars, declined 41.9% QoQ to $1.3 billion, this tells only part of the story. When denominated in AVAX, native DeFi TVL actually rose 34.5% QoQ to 97.5 million AVAX. Messari attributed this divergence to AVAX’s price falling faster than the underlying value held within DeFi protocols.
The stablecoin market, including assets like USDT and USDC, also grew modestly, with its combined market cap increasing 1.7% QoQ to $1.8 billion. However, the standout performer was the real-world assets (RWA) sector. RWA TVL on Avalanche skyrocketed 68.6% quarter-over-quarter and 949.3% year-over-year, climbing from $789.8 million to $1.33 billion. This explosive growth in tokenized real-world assets emerged as the ecosystem’s strongest segment, showcasing a major use case gaining traction irrespective of broader crypto market sentiment.
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