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Description

Realized Capitalization (Realized Cap) represents the value of an asset based on the price at which it was last moved. This metric is available for both ETH and BTC, providing a comparison between traditional Market Cap and Realized Cap.

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Use Cases

Realized Cap serves as an alternative measure to Market Cap. While Market Cap reflects the total value of assets at the current price, Realized Cap reflects the value of all assets at the last price they moved. It can also be interpreted as the aggregate cost basis of all coins within a network, representing the cumulative value of all assets based on their last transaction price. Due to the calculation methodology, older assets have significant influence on Realized Cap because they were last moved at earlier, often lower prices. When older tokens move, their value is re-priced at the current price, potentially causing substantial shifts in Realized Cap. When Realized Cap exceeds Market Cap, the network is considered to be at an aggregate loss (out of profit). Conversely, when Realized Cap is lower than Market Cap, the network is in aggregate profit.

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Methodology

  • Market Cap = Total supply × Current price
  • Realized Price = Amount × Price at time of last movement
For UTXO-based assets like BTC, the calculation is straightforward since each output has a defined creation price at spend time. For account-based chains like ETH, the calculation is more complex. The methodology for ETH uses a Last In, First Out (LIFO) stack-based accounting model for determining the price of tokens, inspired by Stack Coin Age model | Santiment Academy.