Achievement comes as the CoinDesk 20 crosses all-time high.

What to know: 

• The market cap for all cryptocurrencies has surpassed $4 trillion, driven by a rally in altcoins like XRP and ETH.
• The CoinDesk 20 index, which tracks the largest digital assets, has increased by 35% in the past month.
• Bitcoin's recent surge follows Donald Trump's re-election, sparking investor interest in potential deregulatory crypto policies.

The market cap for all cryptocurrencies surpassed $4 trillion, according to CoinGecko data, as a rally in altcoins like XRP XRP$3,4227 and ether (ETH) continues, with traders rotating out of bitcoin BTC$118 705,63.

This uncharted territory for crypto pushed the CoinDesk 20 (CD20), a measure of the performance of the largest digital assets, past 4,000. The index is up 35% in the past month.

Crypto's market cap passed $3 trillion for the first time in November 2021, marking the peak of a pandemic-fueled bull market driven by loose monetary policy, surging institutional interest, and speculative mania across NFTs, DeFi, and gaming tokens.

However, that moment proved fleeting: markets soon turned as macroeconomic tightening took hold, and high-profile collapses like Terra and FTX sent valuations spiraling, with bitcoin dropping as low as $15,625.

It would take three long years and a new political cycle for crypto to reclaim that high-water mark. 

In November 2024, bitcoin surged 36%, its fourth-strongest monthly performance since October 2021, after Donald Trump’s re-election rekindled risk appetite among investors betting on a deregulatory crypto policy pivot in Washington, culminating in the recent passing of the GENIUS Act.

With analysts saying that the top for BTC is "nowhere near," crypto may surpass the next trillion-dollar valuation far faster than the last, potentially in a matter of months rather than years, as capital rotates into altcoins and institutional inflows accelerate across spot ETFs and on-chain assets.