Crypto Overview: What Happened In May?

We are entering the second half of 2023 and the crypto market still remains somewhat unstable. Looking at May, we can say that this has not been the best month for crypto in 2023, but it also has not been the worst. While only 5 cryptocurrencies inside the top 30 managed to show positive results, the rest did not suffer huge losses. On average, most cryptocurrencies that lost value in may, lose around 6-8% of their value and there were only 3 cryptocurrencies that have managed to lose double digit values. But what happened exactly, and why did the market behave this way? This is exactly what we will be taking a look at today, to see the top 5 best and worst performing cryptocurrencies inside the top 30 for the month of May. The following analysis is prepared by the investfox analytical team.

Top 5 Gainers

May was most certainly not the great month for crypto investors, as we only saw positive gains from just 5 cryptocurrencies inside the top 30, with one of them only having +0.5% price gain. The rest of the gainers also did not perform much better with around 6% being the average win for them. There were few reasons that caused this downward month, with reasons such as USD increasing in value having its own effect on the crypto market. So let’s take a look at each of these cryptocurrencies individually and see what happened to them this past month.

XRP +9.7%

The cryptocurrency that gained the most in the month of May was XRP. The reason for this price movement can not be attributed to one single significant reason and it was mostly caused by market sentiment and simple bullish run. In fact, XRP did not have a good start at the beginning of May with its price dropping by around 10% in the first two weeks. Everything changed for XRP come May 17, when the price started to rise pretty significantly. At the end of the month, XRP was trading for $0.526 and was showing +9.7% gain from the start of the month, but compared to the lowest price, the increase is way bigger. When it comes to reasons, as we mentioned before, there is no single reason that caused this increase. But taking a closer look, there is one fact that stands out and most certainly had some level of impact on the price of XRP. Around the time when prices started to rise, XRP recorded a very high number of Daily Active Addresses, meaning that there were transactions made by a large number of users, which could have shifted the market towards a bullish run.

Tron +9.6%

Another cryptocurrency that gained almost 10% of the value in May is Tron. Looking at the Tron chart we can see that it had a slow and volatile start to the month, with prices going up and down, but still remaining relatively even. Everything changed around May 20, when the price suddenly started to rise, going from 0.07$ to almost $0.08. During this time, Tron had one of the highest social and market activity on the market and was overall number 1 ranked crypto by popularity for a short period of time. This popularity did not last very long and Tron soon started to lose some of its value and ended a month on a bit of a downward trend. But despite this, Tron still managed to close the month with the 9.6% gain in value compared to the start of the month, going from $0.068 to $0.075.

Litecoin +4.7%

Being one of the oldest cryptocurrencies on the market, Litecoin has been a constant figure inside the top 20 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization. In the month of May, Litecoin suffered from volatility with prices going up and down on a constant basis. At the start of May, Litecoin was trading for $88 and in just 9 days it was down to $77, which was the lowest point during this month. When price reached $77 it reached the support level and soon trend reversal took place with prices starting to soar. On May 18, Litecoin reached its highest valuation in May, and it was trading for $94.5. But then once again volatility hit and price fell down to $83, but it soon recovered and Litecoin managed to end the month with a valuation of $92 and overall monthly increase of around 4.7%.

Ethereum +1.4%

One of the last two cryptocurrencies that showed positive gains in May is Ethereum. While it is good to see that Ethereum's price increased in the month of May, this was a pretty insignificant increase by 1.4%, which is nothing in the world of cryptocurrencies. May was a very volatile month for Ethereum as prices went up and down on a constant basis. This was an interesting volatile period for Ethereum, and many experienced traders took advantage of these constantly changing prices, as Ethereum had a very high trading volume, especially if we compare it to previous months. Everything started on a positive note for Ethereum as price started to rise at the beginning of May and by May 6, Ethereum had gone from trading for $1830 to $2006. But this 2k mart was not long lived and Ethereum soon started to lose value and in just 6 days it was once again down to $1758 valuation. From this point Ethereum entered a volatile period with prices going up and down until May 25. It was during the last week of May when Ethereum once again started to gain value and reached $1900 value pretty quickly. But once again, this was a short lived increase and prices started to fall again. Ethereum closed the month with value of $1861 and a 1.4% increase from the start of the month.

Stellar +0.5%

The last gainer on our list is Stellar. While technically Stellar gained the value in the month of May, it was just by 0.5%. Because of this, we can say that this was a fully neutral month for Stellar as it practically did not gain or lost anything. But despite this, if we look at the chart we can see that things were not as calm as the end of the month numbers show. Stellar started the first week of May in a small volatile state, but then prices started to fall and we entered a very volatile market. Stellar prices were going up and down and the chart resembled a heart beat monitor for just over two weeks and then it saw one more drop in value where it reached its lowest valuation of the month. From here, prices started to go up, but they still remained volatile with constant rises and drops, but in the end it ended as a bullish run and Stellar ended the month pretty much where it began.

Top 5 Losers

As we mentioned, there were only 5 cryptocurrencies inside the top 30 that managed to gain value, so the competition between those that lost was pretty tough. Out of those cryptocurrencies that lost value in May, three coins saw drops over 10%, while the majority of other cryptocurrencies lost around 6-7%. Looking at three coins that lost over 10%, we can consider them a pretty notable drop, while other cryptocurrencies did not suffer that much and can easily recover this month. So let’s take a look at these cryptocurrencies to see what happened to them in May.

Avalanche -15%

The title of biggest loser of May goes to Avalanche as it managed to lose 15% of its value last month. Everything started pretty good for Avalanche as it saw gain in value during the first 6 days of May, but then everything changed pretty quickly. On May 6, Avalanche started to lose value and it continued to drop pretty sharply for 3 days with prices going from $17.30 to $15.28. From this point the downward trend slowed down but did not end and Avalanche continued to lose value. At this time Avalanche entered a volatile state with prices going up and down, but overall it was losing small value each day. It was during the last few days when Avalanche tried to recover and had a slight increase in price, but it was very short lived and Avalanche eventually ended the month valued just under $14 and lose of %15 in May.

Shiba Inu -14.7%

Standing one spot above Avalanche, Shiba Inu is currently the 16th largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization. May was not a good month for Shiba as it managed to lose 14.7% of its value and ended the month on a pretty bad note. Just like most other cryptocurrencies, Shiba started May on a decent note as price remained relatively stable for the first 6 days. But then everything changed in an instant and Shiba started to sharply drop in value. In just 6 days Shiba went from trading for $0.00001004 to $0.00000860, during this time Shiba entered a volatile state and prices started to move up and down. It was on May 22, when Shiba had a small spike in value but it was very short lived and in just two days it fell even lower. From there, Shiba repeated the same process once again and ended the month on a downward trend after a small spike.

Toncoin -13.3%

The last cryptocurrency that lost double digits in May is Toncoin. This is a cryptocurrency that was created by Telegram, which then had to stop its operations on the TON network. Looking at the Toncoin chart in May it is filled with multiple upward and downward trends that interchanged multiple times. Toncoin started the month with small volatility and price was going up and down, but by the beginning of the second week it entered a downward trend. This downward trend ended on May 12, when Toncoin reached $1.79 value, and from there prices started to go up. This uptrend continued for almost one week, but then soon after Toncoin entered another downtrend, with price once again going down to $1.80. From here, Toncoin started to gain value once again and the price soared to $2.05. This was the last uptrend for Toncoin during May and from May 24, until the end of the month Toncoin was losing value. It ended the month with a valuation of $1.78 and 13.3% loss of value in May.

Doge -8.2%

The second meme coin on our losers list is Doge, which managed to lose 8.2% of its value in May. Doge had a pretty busey April, where we saw Doge price spike really sharply on two occasions to then lose all of the gains also in a short period of time. Moving into May, Doge was on the downward trend following one of these spikes and this downfall continued for the whole duration of May. At first the price was somewhat stable, but moving into the second week of May Doge dropped from $0.08 to $0.072 and entered a volatile state. This volatility continued throughout the whole month with few sharp drops and spikes. Doge closed the month with $0.071 value and 8.2% drop in value.

Polkadot -7.7%

The last crypto on our losers list is Polkadot, which lost 7.7% of its value during the last month. Polkadot had a very volatile and stressful month of May, where prices jumped up and down on a constant basis. While it could have been great news for traders who are familiar with trading on volatile markets, for investors and less experienced traders, this was a bad month. Everything started with good volatility, as despite there being volatility, prices were going up. But almost a week into the month, Polkadot started to lose value and in just 6 days it went from $5.88 to $5.11. From there on volatility continued and prices were moving very actively for the remainder of the month. It was during the last few days, when Polkadot tried to have a resurgence, but this fell apart pretty quickly and during the last two days prices fell once again. Polkadot closed the month valued at $5.24 and overall loss of 7.7% of its value.

Final Thoughts

May was a bad month for cryptocurrencies as only 5 coins managed to show greens, and even those that did, could not gain over 10%. But we also did not have any significant value losses, as only 3 coins lost over 10% of their value and none over 15%. With this we can say that, there is nothing to fear about and this was a result of multiple small factors that all contributed to the last month being unproductive.

This is a great time to look at the market and analyze what is going on exactly. Historically, if there is no panic on the market and we see a month like this, usually following month few cryptocurrencies see big gains. While it is impossible to predict exactly which coins will do so, taking a quick look at the market on a constant basis and staying up to date with ongoing events will most likely lead to good investment opportunities in June.