The gold market sees a shift in the activity where the central bank buys slower and demand from exchange -traded funds and gold -supported cryptocurrencies growing. The latter recently moved to a three -year height, measured by net mint volume to tokens, supported by precious metal.

Over $ 80 million worth of these tokens were marked over the past month, according to data from Rwa.xyz. This boost helped push the sector’s market growth up 6% to $ 1.43 billion. Meanwhile, the monthly transfer volume rose 77% to $ 1.27 billion, marking a sharp resurgence of interest in digital representations of precious metal.

The increase in token activity mirrors a wider trend in the gold market.

World Gold Council’s latest report shows that the overall demand for gold in the first quarter of the year reached 1,206 ton-an increase of 1% over the year and the strongest first quarter since 2016. The wave came despite a slowdown in the central bank’s purchase, which fell to 244 tonnes, down from 365 tonnes in the fourth quarter.

Gold ETFs played a key role in the shift. Investment demand has more than doubled to 552 tonnes, suggesting that investors are moving into precious metal, a step in central banks is known for historically.

These influxes helped push the average quarterly price of gold for record $ 2,860 per day. Ounce, an increase of 38% from the previous year. Still, the price dipped 2.35% last week after he rose 23.5% years to date, while risk assets, including cryptocurrencies, increased. Spot Gold is currently trading for $ 3,240.

While traditional gold demand, such as jewelry, a downturn drewing to low-time slaves and coin needs remained, especially in China.

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