The headline is falling volume.

The signal is where the remaining volume concentrates.

Total spot activity contracted sharply in December. That part is obvious.
What’s less obvious is that DEX share increased at the same time.

That combination is very important.

When volume collapses and share shifts, it’s not enthusiasm rotating. It’s behavior changing.

In low-vol regimes, traders don’t need constant execution. They need clean execution. Fewer trades, more intentional positioning, lower tolerance for hidden costs. That’s when custody, fee leakage, and settlement risk start to matter more than raw liquidity.

DEXs don’t win during mania because speed dominates.
They gain ground when selectivity dominates.

The remaining flow is choosing:

• transparent settlement
• capital efficiency
• reduced counterparty exposure

Not as ideology. As optimization.

This is why rising DEX share during drawdowns is more durable than spikes during incentive cycles. Incentives pull volume in. Structural preference keeps it there.

The takeaway isn’t “DEXs are winning.”
It’s that execution surfaces are being stress-tested, and a growing slice of active capital is opting onchain even when there’s less to do.

That’s how adoption actually shows up.
Not when markets expand, but when participation contracts and choice still shifts.

This is filtering behavior, not growth.
And filtered behavior is the part that sticks.